Big Picture Progress Update - August 2018
The progress with our portfolio of community investments and Ready for Kindergarten goal has been remarkable in the last year. In August 2017, we began to focus on ensuring access to pre-K education for all children in our community. Research and experience have shown this is a critical element of a thriving community. In Multnomah County alone, more than 75% of our priority preschool-aged children lack access to an experience that provides the tools for success in school and life: playing with others (collaboration), focusing on a task, overcoming adversity, and literacy and numeracy skills to call out a few. Without access to a quality early learning experience for every child, the first day of kindergarten is the first day of failure for some children. What’s more, it’s the start of a long, expensive, and fruitless battle by public schools to help those kids succeed as research shows that only 13% of children behind their peers in kindergarten will ever catch up. To move this priority forward, we have worked closely with our nonprofit and government Community Partners to produce the following:
1) PRESCHOOL FOR ALL SYMPOSIUM
We co-hosted more than 200 community leaders, educators and parents for the Preschool for All Symposium at Portland State University. The day featured representatives from Seattle, San Francisco, and Denver sharing lessons learned in implementing universal preschool systems in their cities as well as community planning to build such a system in Portland.
WHY IT MATTERS: This gathering illustrated the growing and diverse community buy-in to universal pre-K that helped to secure political leadership for the effort.
2) “WHITE PAPER” RESEARCHSVP published research on how communities around the country have implemented universal pre-K systems. “Preschool for All: Investing in Equity” highlights a variety of implementation models and common elements of a successful effort, such as having early money and political leadership for the effort.
WHY IT MATTERS: The “white paper” provides both the evidence of successful efforts and the glaring fact that Portland is falling behind its peer cities in early learning supports. This, in turn, has helped to fuel the movement for Preschool for All with community leaders.
3) MOVING THE NEEDLE WITH COUNTY LEADERSHIP
We secured a partnership with Multnomah County through Commissioner Jessica Vega Pederson to champion the Preschool for All effort locally. By bringing together our Community Partners/Investees and other leaders in education and government, SVP and Commissioner Vega Pederson secured $100,000 to advance a Preschool for All county task force that will bring together the political, community, and parent leadership for a community strategy to provide universal access to preschool.
WHY IT MATTERS: SVP and other community-based nonprofits provide critical grassroots support for a universal preschool effort but can’t provide the “grasstops” political support that is necessary for a broad, public solution. Success with the Task Force would yield the public/private partnerships and plan needed to scale up the financing, infrastructure, and workforce for 4x the number of pre-k children and families currently served. It’s a HUGE step forward.
4) INVESTOR PARTNERS COLLABORATE TO REFINE OUR FOCUS
In 2018, We convened a number of Partners with early childhood expertise to refine and deepen SVP’s strategy of creating equitable access to early learning experiences (such as preschool). By co-creating with Community Partners/Investees, the Partners have identified where we can make the most impact given best known practice, needs of the community, and SVP’s unique assets.
WHY IT MATTERS: The Partners’ efforts provide clarity on the investment strategy, decision-making tools, and success measurement needed for SVP to take the right kinds of calculated community investment risks. These tools are also helping to shape countywide strategy through the Preschool for All Task Force.
5) COMMUNITY PARTNERS COLLABORATE TO INCREASE FUNDING
While we work with our Community Partners/Investees to build their operational capacity and grow their programs serving children and families, we know they can’t do it all with just donations. For example, we have helped Latino Network serve 10x more kids locally but the path to serving 5,000+--a target our Partners helped them plot a course to achieve--requires government investment. Through advocacy grants from SVP, Latino Network and several other Community Partners/Investees began advocating for that funding. Knowing there is strength in numbers, they began collaborating and now have developed a formal statewide collaborative, which SVP is supporting through fundraising and capacity building.
WHY IT MATTERS: Grassroots organizing helps to amplify the voices of the people closest to the needs when decisions about our tax dollars are distributed. This collaboration will help add that voice to state and local discussions about preschool.